Purity – so simple a word, yet so heavily laden with meaning. Purity and non-sexuality are bonded in an illicit marriage, one that is fed by religious stories of divine insemination and that breeds a society that still idolizes virginity in women. Not that there is anything wrong with magic and virginity, or is there? I would never know, for I have never been pure.
I was robbed me of my purity. I was robbed me of my ‘firsts’.
I don’t remember my first kiss. I don’t remember the first time my body was touched. I don’t remember the first time I understood that dirty thing that adults talked about.
I do remember the first time he put a screwdriver inside me.
I yearn to be pure. I yearn to have been given a chance to wear white at my wedding. I yearn to know what it is like to be normal so I can hold my daughter’s hand some day, and tell her what to expect from life. I yearn to have had a beautiful story to share with the world about my own youth.
Instead, I offer these. My stories. For the children I will have some day, for the children who are out there today, and for those of us who still have within us, the wounded children of yesterday.
Let’s redefine purity, by redefining ourselves. I am pure because I choose to be. You are too.
